In his first interview since announcing he was leaving the White House, Rove also revealed why he thought Hillary Clinton was a “fatally flawed” candidate for president.

Rove told radio host Rush Limbaugh that he is often “amused” by references to Bush as “brain dead” or “frat boy.”

In his Wednesday interview he told Rush: “This is one of the best-read people I’ve ever met. This is a Harvard MBA. A Yale undergraduate whose major was history and whose passion is history.”

Those “elite, effete snobs” who criticize him — the “people on the Upper East Side who are putting their nose in the air about him — can’t hold a candle to him.”

He also told Rush that that after a 34-year relationship, he’s never “ceased to be amazed” by Bush.

“He’s just as passionate today about doing his job of protecting America and growing the economy … as he was the day he came in.”

Asked how he deals with constant criticism from what Rush calls the “drive-by media,” Rove said he tries to “just ignore” it. He said his life would be pitiful if he needed to be “validated” by The New York Times.

And he disclosed that Bush often dismisses attacks by saying, “Don’t worry, history will get it right and we’ll both be dead.”

Rove, who is currently the deputy White house chief of staff, said Monday that he would leave his post at the end of August. Recalling the 2000 election controversy in Florida, Rove said that “some Democrats never got over” the results and “hate” Bush.

“Some made a calculated decision … that the way back out of the political wilderness for them was to simply obstruct everything the president was trying to do.”

As for his prediction about the likely Democratic candidate for president, Rove repeated an earlier remark that Hillary Clinton would probably be the nominee but is “fatally flawed.”

He said Hillary’s record on healthcare issues has been “spotty and poor.” And when Rush asked Rove to be more specific about Hillary’s “flaw,” Rove pointed out: “There is no front-runner who has entered the primary season with negatives as high as she has in the history of modern polling.”

He pointed to polls that reveal Hillary has a negative rating in the “high 40s,” and added: “There is nobody who has ever won the presidency who has started out in that kind of position.”

On board with Bush since the beginning of his political career in Texas, Rove was nicknamed “the architect” and “boy genius” by the president for designing the strategy that twice won him the White House.

On Monday, Limbaugh called Rove “one of the smartest people you would ever run into.”

Bush has recently been courting conservative radio hosts in an effort to bolster support for his policies, especially on the Iraq war. On Aug. 1, he met with 10 conservative hosts at the White House for a discussion that one host, Glenn Beck, termed “shockingly frank.”

The next day, Rush Limbaugh visited the White House, where he had dinner with the president and first lady and enjoyed a cigar with Bush and presidential counselor Ed Gillespie in the Treaty Room.

The following morning, Rush had breakfast with Rove at the White House.